I may have gotten it all wrong.
Online breathwork on April 16th.
Detroit Folks: Two live breathwork sessions, in Pleasant Ridge on April 27th and Troy on May 4th.
Portugal retreat from Nov. 9th-15th: only two spots left.
Hi Friends,
I may have been in denial about the human race. At the very least naive in my understanding that we are, each of us at our core, peaceful and loving beings. That it is a lifetime of conditioning and fear that steers us away from our most innate way of existing. That we only need to remember who we really are, and to honor our true nature.
But what if our true nature is one of violence? What if we are a species more naturally prone to go to war instead of peace? To hate instead of love?
There’s that quote we’ve likely heard, popularized by MLK Jr.: The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.
But does it? How can we know that for sure?
I’ve reassured myself, many times, that we are evolving, slowly but surely, into a more compassionate, heart-led species. As though that were the only possibility. The more we wake up to our conditioning, the more we become aware of our minds’ manipulations and lies, the more likely we are to act in alignment with love. Or so I thought.
I’m not so sure anymore. Look at this country. Look at this world. Have I simply been waiting for lions to stop eating gazelles? It is in their nature to eat gazelles, and silly to expect them not to. We’re the lions in that metaphor, if that wasn’t clear. I guess we’re the gazelles too. All of us eating and getting eaten by one another.
I’m not sure it’s helpful to sell myself on the belief that, despite the endless wars, and injustice, and suffering, we are actually trending toward a more loving society and world. That kindness and compassion represent our truest nature and we’re just taking the long, messy, unpredictable road home to it.
It sure doesn’t look like that. It has never looked like that. The history of humanity is painted with blood. We have waged war for land, for oil, for power, for pride. We have enslaved one another, all across the globe, have colonized entire cultures, have committed — continue to commit — outrageous atrocities for a host of reasons that generally seem to distill down to fear and greed.
Violence is far from an outlier in our world. It is the way.
Evolution appears to favor survival over compassion and kindness. From an evolutionary standpoint, aggression, territorialism, and domination have served our species well. At least if well means landing at the top of the food chain. If well means our ability to conquer and control. Maybe our evolutionary wiring prioritizes self-preservation over connection, fear over trust, and force over forgiveness. Our current reality certainly supports this premise.
Every new year when it’s time to consider one word that speaks to the energy I want to inhabit for the year ahead, I generally land on acceptance. At least it always makes it to the final round. I love the energy of acceptance, of acknowledging and being with what is as it is. And yet, I have been unwilling to accept that we humans always eventually, inevitably, return to fear, and that our reaction to fear will almost certainly lead to division, dehumanization, and violence. All of us lions. Most of us gazelles.
At least lately it has helped me to view humans through this lens. It has helped to stop expecting people to show up differently and instead to bring acceptance to the possibility that we will never evolve toward greater love because, though love is certainly an aspect of who we are, it is not our most innate nature. No matter how much love is there, we seem always to gravitate toward fear and violence, as though they are the North Stars to which our inner compass is most attracted, is most at home.
Maybe love is not our truest nature. Maybe love is our rebellion.
I don’t know.
How about a counterpoint?
If violence were our truest nature, why are most of us so disturbed by it? Why do we gather in protest against injustice? Why do strangers rush to help one another in natural disasters? Why do children instinctively seek out comfort? Though we’re witnessing a profound lack of empathy across the planet, there’s no doubting we are a deeply empathetic species. It’s not hard to find, should we seek it, endless examples of kindness, compassion and love.
If humans were inherently violent, I doubt we would be so haunted by violence. It would not be something we felt the need to justify or heal from. The fact that war wounds us (at least most of us), that abuse traumatizes us, that injustice sparks outrage, suggests inhumanity and brutality are not representative of our deepest nature. Maybe our hearts continue to cry out for something more beautiful because they know that something more beautiful is possible. If we allowed ourselves to be who we truly are. If we allowed ourselves to be led by love.
Maybe we are all innately loving beings who have just lost our way.
We humans, like so much here, are filled with contradictions. We hurt others, and we help them heal. We justify war and protest for peace. We revel in our hypocrisy, shaming others for doing the exact things we ourselves are doing. We are capable of the most heinous brutality and the most profound compassion. We are complex, and wildly frustrating and heartbreaking in our complexity.
Maybe we’re not inherently anything, or we are inherently everything. And evolution is not a linear process. We, as a species, will continue to lurch forward, and fall back, and lurch forward, and fall back, ad infinitum.
I’d love to believe that love is not just our starting point, but our destiny. But who knows if it was even our starting point?
And does it matter?
So what is there to do with these perspectives, these possibilities? How am I called to show up in this reality, whether I believe humans are inherently loving or violent? Whether I believe we are evolving toward or away from love?
This is where things get easier for me, when I tune into what feels most true for me, most in alignment with my deepest nature, at least as I understand it.
I am called to show up as a voice for love. As a reminder that kindness and compassion don’t just feel great but also create the possibility for deeper connection with one another, for actual healing.
Whether or not we as a species are inherently loving, we are beings who will never stop desiring love. To give and receive it. Each of us, I believe, knows love to be the most uplifting, energizing energy there is, and we will continue to hunger for it. That is most certainly in our nature. If only we would realize that we are not made safer by turning away from love, but by turning toward it. By understanding that wars only create more wars, internally and externally. We cannot hate ourselves and each other into a peaceful reality.
This is ultimately the choice for all of us to consider: Who do we want to be in this world? Who do you want to be in this world? No matter how you view the reality here, how are you called to show up within it?
There is no answer that allows for the avoidance of pain. Another truth worth accepting: pain is part of the story here. A big part for many of us. Too big a part for too many of us.
What I’ve come to discover, again and again, is that staying connected to the energy of my heart, to love, supports in a helpful way absolutely anything I’m thinking, saying and doing, everything I’m experiencing. Self-love doesn’t take away life’s many pains, but it does help me feel more supported when I’m confronting them.
It is a beautiful thing to love yourself, to have your own back, perhaps especially when so much in the world seems bleak. And the gift of self-love, as with all love, is that it never stops with self. Love always serves all. This I know to be true without a doubt, and so I will remain committed to love.
Here’s to us all fostering a deeper connection to the love within us, and by extension a more compassionate connection with one another. Thanks for bringing your open hearts to this space. I’m grateful for your presence here.
So much big love,
xoxo…Scott
Oh Scott. My heart hurts thinking about all of this. But I've been meaning to share something (waiting til I could write eloquently about it...... but this will do for now.)
During a breathwork event with you..... I had the most amazing revelations. A series of things I already knew that floated across a black visual space and fell in place, fitting together like puzzle pieces.
1. I was a middle school teacher for years and loved it. But it is filled with bullying and drama. Parents would often get pretty freaked out by things their kids did or said. I didn't excuse hurtful behavior. But I did explain a lot of it like this: We hit a point around middle school age where we are learning about our power and control. That we can elicit various responses from others with our words and actions. We learn to manipulate. Often through bullying. We test to see how far those powers can go. How far our power can reach. It's awful and painful and very often wrong. It needs adults to step in. But it is also natural. And developmental. And even a little bit necessary as we learn to manage the world around us. And then later our empathy and critical thinking and emotional intelligence catches up..... and we bully less. Well, at least most of us do. Or at least we fine tune it into types of manipulation that are more socially acceptable and less obviously hurtful to others.
This was one of the puzzle pieces. Here was another. The one that caught me off guard.
2. America is young compared to other countries. Humans are young compared to other species. And we have made it through the baby/ toddler/ childhood stages. We are holding our own. Making it through. Building. Creating. Often even cooperating.
But MAYBE we have hit the "middle school" phase of development. As Americans or humans. The place where we have reached an apex of our bullying ability. The height of "how hard can I push" or "how much can I get." Maybe this is where we are in our evolution. A shitty place. A rough place. A challenging and frustrating place. But also a temporary place.
3. I LOVE MY MIDDLE SCHOOL KIDS! They are obnoxious. Outrageous. So often they are just wrong. But there they are trying to figure it out. Pushing. Hurting. Getting hurt. LEARNING how it all works. Not quite able to show enough compassion. Not yet. But I know that will come after we get through this stinky time. (Seriously ..... this age group even smells bad!)
4. So..... (And Scott, you have taught me this more than anyone else.) If this is who we are right now. Who we are surrounded by right now. This bullying pubescent space. Then maybe I can love them (us) for who they (we) are. And maybe I can trust that we will grow through and out of this phase. That empathy will come. Critical thinking will come. Maturity will come. Love and peace and goodness will come.
5. The last of the floating puzzle pieces I will share for today. My son wants to be a palenotologist. So all of his life (most of mine) we have been learning about dinosaur timelines. Time lines measured by millions and billions of years. Species that have emerged and grown and dominated and faded away. Vanished, only to be replaced by something new. Something that is "better" in one way or another. So I am recognizing that the timeline of my middle school analogy might be long. Maturing out of this space might not happen in my lifetime. Or my kids. In this moment during our breating experience - I felt like it might not even be humans! Maybe it will be whatever comes after us. Whatever comes next. Because in the total universal timeline, to think we are the ultimate creation is horribly vain.
The arc of the moral universe is long. So long. Longer than we can imagine. The sad news is we may have to recognize that it is so long that we may not see it bend. The good news is that it is so long that I have to believe it WILL eventually bend.
So many more thoughts..... really must try to put this together better. In my mind and on paper. But I wanted to share these after reading your message today.
So much love to you, Scott. It's a drop in the bucket. But the love that you share and I share and we share..... It matters. It makes a difference in the universe. That we must believe.
This is incredible synchronicity, because just a few moments before this post arrived in my mailbox, I was telling my friend a very similar thing - that I don't know anymore how to live in this world where humans never stop hurting humans. I used to find peace of mind and the presence of love more easily. Recently my mind seems to be in incessant turmoil, and I'm feeling a kind of exhaustion and confusion I haven't experienced before.
What was my friend's advice: that he thinks the important thing is to focus on how I want to live, because I am not responsible for the whole world. And to create and value connections with fellow humans, since that's what we truly need as species.
Truly, our hearts don't lie when they speak to us in so many ways, quiet or loud, about what we really want in life, what gives us joy, what makes us feel right from the core. I believe that the tragedy of the human race is that so many of us have had this inherent connection to self severed while still very young, by older humans who were also wronged and disconnected from their own hearts. Why is it easier to put out someone's light than to accept one's own? Why have we come to trust what we've been told over what we feel?
I hope that amidst heartbreak I will somehow find enough acceptance to go on, and the way of being that aligns with my heart's longings.